Will 'O The Wisp
by Steelcircle
Summary: Red Alert matches his wits against a murderer as subtle as a ghost and destructive as wildfire. Can Red Alert catch the murderer before the death total spirals out of control? Meanwhile, an old friend asks Red Alert a favour in finding a missing person.


**Will 'O The Wisp**

Red Alert swore he was the only Autobot who actually took standing watch seriously. Well, someone had to. He saw them nodding off or daydreaming. Maybe they thought they could get away with it, that what they did didn't matter, but they'd be haunted enough if it was their laxity that led to the death of their comrades. Why couldn't they see that he just wanted to spare them that burden when he set off their car alarms?

Sideswipe came to with a shake and snort. He glanced left and right, half-panicked, and he eventually moaned, "Sunstreaker, you slagging son of a... Sunstreaker?" He squinted at Red Alert, bewildered.

Red Alert tapped his datapad with the watch roster clearly showing and replied, "Wrong Lamborghini."

"Ha ha," Sideswipe replied, without humour. "Real funny there, Red Alert."

Red Alert shook his head and insisted, "No, what's funny is that you're scheduled to be standing watch, and I find you here recharging instead."

"It was a cowboy nap," Sideswipe excused.

Red Alert looked at Sideswipe blankly, sighed, and said, "That's a Terran term."

"Sheesh, don't you watch Westerns, Red Alert?" Sideswipe gestured animatedly. "Cowboys could nap - that's sort of a short recharge cycle - with one optic open, so they were ready for danger."

"One optic open, eh? So that's how I was able to sneak up right into your face?" Red Alert noted dryly, standing nearly nose to nose with the other Lamborghini to prove his point.

"Er... yeah. Lay off. I was having a nice dream about this sweet little-"

"Sideswipe, while you were chasing imaginary bumpers, there could have been a Decepticon breaking in!" Red Alert shouted, losing his patience.

Sideswipe looked appropriately sheepish at last and asked, "...was there?"

"No. There could have been, though, and that was my point." Red Alert put his hands on his hips.

He did not notice Blurr arrive at his side, and the speedster's words hit Red Alert's audios before he was even aware Blurr was in the area. Blurr urged, "Red Alert! Red Alert, there's smoke, so there's probably fire, and if there's fire, we really need a fire truck, and you should come see this right now."

Red Alert just about jumped. He set his jaw in place, wishing vainly that Blurr would stop doing... that. He was just being Blurr, Red Alert knew, but Blurr being Blurr was going to cause Red Alert a fuel pump lock-up someday, he just knew it. With an exasperated sigh, he stabbed a finger at Sideswipe and promised, "We'll talk more about this later." Red Alert turned to follow Blurr, who was already gone.

Blurr again reappeared and explained, "This way, right over here, down the hall, left, left, right, left," apparently having noticed Red Alert's slowness.

Red Alert followed Blurr into a sparse barrack. The room belonged to Lowbrow, an older Autobot. Red Alert could smell the acrid scent of smoke even outside the room, and inside the room, there was another odour, one that took Red Alert to a story he didn't want to tell. He looked over his shoulder, checking to make sure that Blurr was still there. Red Alert rubbed the back of his helmet, steeled himself, and explained, "Electrical components tend to have distinctive smells when they burn. One day, Sparkplug was walking by with a grilled cheese and bacon sandwich, I believe it was, and I nearly lost my cubes. Turns out, bacon smells exactly like an incinerated laser core."

Blurr vanished out of the area, presumably to an area where he could tidily deposit his last repast, and Red Alert was left alone in a room thick with sooty smoke. There was a pile of ash and twisted metal on the floor. The metal looked more like softened wax. Stiff struts and panels shouldn't have run like water, but here they did. A flash of char-streaked components could be picked out here or there, and pieces of panels showed the faded, subdued colours that Lowbrow wore - had worn.

Red Alert grimaced and held a hand to his head. He cursed, laying down blame on every idiot who ever dozed off on watch but mostly upon himself. He was the security director, and the smoke alarms should have gone off long before they did. Moreover, the assailant should not have been able to sneak into Iacon so easily. Red Alert could easily list off half a dozen things that should have stopped anyone, and they would have all had to fail. If the systems had failed, so had he.

Red Alert flipped his radio out of his gauntlet and put in a call. "Blaster? Turn down that racket. There's been a murder." He sniffed at the smoke again. "Recent. The perp may still be Iacon. Get your men on it." He weathered Blaster's storm of questions. "What do I know about the guy? He's got a flamethrower that can pump out temperatures higher than 1510 degrees C." The cooling steel on the floor told him as much. "That's what I know about him. Or her." Red Alert retracted the radio back into his arm and muttered, "Frag."

Stifling his desire to make the air any bluer than it already was, Red Alert brought the radio out again and contacted Silverbolt. He barked, "Silverbolt, we've got a murderer loose in the vicinity of Iacon. I want the sky swept so clean even that electric louse Windsweeper wouldn't find fault." Silverbolt wanted a description, of course he did. Blasted visual-based jets. "No, I don't what the retrorat looks like. Watch out for a flamethrower."

Red Alert put in one last radio and found the other side of the line about as sulky as he would have expected. "Still sore about monitor duty? You'll be sorer if I catch you've been negligent, Mirage. Has there been anything unusual on the monitors in the last, eh, two hours?" Red Alert tilted his head to the side, annoyed. "Bumblebee had a medium energon instead of a small? Leakin' hilarious. You know what I mean." The worst thing about working with competent members of the intelligence community was that they were competent members of the intelligence community: they knew exactly what he meant and what he needed, and yet they would make him work for it, just to verify that he, too, was capable enough to deserve what they knew. "...nothing? No doors ajar? No Autobots slightly disrupted, as if they'd walked into someone not there? No sewer hatches mysteriously opened for maintenance, when the crew won't be out for weeks? I... all right, all right. I'll review each of those tapes myself."

Red Alert turned to Lowbrow's remains and murmured, "I'm sorry won't cut it now. Nothing will. I'll catch that slagger, though."

* * *

Blaster and the Aerialbots turned up nothing, as did extensive later searches. Red Alert was left to work on the case with not much of a start. He considered Decepticons first. An Autobot would be an easy answer, but it rested uneasily with Red Alert. Death by combustion and induced melting was a horrible way to go. Red Alert liked to think, short-sighted and foolish as Autobots could be, that they generally did not possess the pure level of cruelty that would lead to using a flame-based weapon to its lethal end on a fellow Autobot. An Autobot would have significantly smaller security obstacles to overcome, though. The security tapes did not show anyone entering Lowbrow's room, and it was good for Mirage's own sake, Red Alert supposed, that he did indeed have a good alibi. Personally, Red Alert didn't suspect Mirage, but there would be others who did. For every Cliffjumper who learned his lesson, there were another two with doubts just waiting for a reason to voice them.

Mirage aside, there were dozens of Autobots with stealth capacities. There were never as many of them in the Autobot ranks as there were in the Decepticons, but they were there. Red Alert has no illusions: he didn't know who all of them were, as much as he wished that he did. Be it a stupid crime fresh out of the factory or a sordid love triangle, there were any number of reason why an Autobot wouldn't report his full capacities and background.

Red Alert's list of Decepticons who were possibly good enough, either by skills or special abilities, to bypass his security systems in the heart of Iacon was even shorter. For one thing, he had point-designed the systems, spending longer hours, days, and weeks than he was now to make sure that the systems were flawless. For another thing, the Decepticon shadow elite had even less reason to make themselves known to the Autobots, and the Autobots' best attempts at nosiness tended to fail as a matter of course when matched against that calibre.

Red Alert had to consider motive, and there, he was stumped. Lowbrow was crude, yet delightfully unrefined, and he could demand the removal of damn punks from his porch with the best of them, but Red Alert doubted that any Autobots bore Lowbrow any ill will. If they did, they'd take it out with garish paint and sugar in the gas tank, not a flamethrower. He supposed that Lowbrow had lived long enough to draw the ire of any number of Decepticons, but he must have outlived most of them.

Maybe the target was random, picked out by some soulless random number generator, the victim meaningless and merely meant to drive him mad trying to decipher a motive that did not exist? Red Alert growled and stared bleakly at the computer terminal. He was going to end up chasing himself in circles. He returned to the list of Decepticons. That class of Decepticon tended to not use flamethrowers or other incendiary weaponry, like frictional igniters and napalm. They understood the value of subtlety, a virtue a flamethrower did not provide. Stinking and bright, flamethrowers were much beloved by shock troops and scum. About the smartest known Decepticon flamethrower user was Sparkstalker. The Firecon was a thorn in Red Alert's side, with his brilliance in counterfeiting and cryptology, but he wasn't suited to sneaking into an Autobot stronghold unseen. It wasn't his style, anyway.

Red Alert put aside the idea of a dedicated flamethrower specialist. Someone more generally competent had broken in and, wanting to make a gruesome statement, had used a flamethrower for the kill this time, even if a sniper's rifle was his usual tool. That seemed the most logical line of investigation. Look into who hated Lowbrow. Look into what he had done.

Besides, the only flamethrower specialist that Red Alert had ever heard of who might have been able to do it was dead now. Red Alert shuddered just thinking about him. Good riddance.

* * *

Sideswipe dropped by Red Alert's office. Red Alert took a while to process that the other Lamborghini was even there and stared at Sideswipe with optics unblinking. His head felt fuzzy, and he wondered why Sideswipe was there. A twinge of something nagged at his memory.

Sideswipe shuffled his feet and said, "I wouldn't go looking for trouble," and that was a bald-faced lie, "but you're usually a little more prompt about your droning lectures. It's been days. What gives?"

Red Alert's first instinct was that Sideswipe had tinkered with his internal chronometre as some sort of elaborate prank. It said more about Red Alert than it did about Sideswipe. He dismissed the notion, although he couldn't deny that it had been there. Red Alert rubbed the back of his helmet, nodded slowly, and said, "Yes. I've been... busy."

"Too busy to harass a 'bot while he's trying to get some shut optic? You're slipping," Sideswipe jested.

"Lowbrow's dead, in case you hadn't heard," Red Alert reminded sharply, annoyed to be torn from his work. He had a fine list of who couldn't have done it. It was growing by the hour.

"I heard!" Sideswipe shot back, too quickly. There was pain his voice, and he let his arms hang slack at his sides. "The stuff you were ranting about earlier, I mean... did it make a difference, do you think?"

He sighed and took a hard look at Sideswipe. They were about the same age, really, but Red Alert couldn't help feeling old. He replied, "I doubt it. The only difference it would have made, if you had seen this guy, would be that there'd be two corpses for the morgue and the priest, not one."

Sideswipe took offence immediately, but if he sought absolution, he should have seen one of those priests instead. He contended, "If I'd seen him, he would have been the corpse, and Lowbrow would be around, shakin' his fist at me and Sunstreaker."

Red Alert shook his head and fixed Sideswipe with a no-nonsense stare. He noted, "You are a competent warrior, Sideswipe. One of our best. If it came down to one-on-one combat, I am quite certain you'd be the victor." He watched Sideswipe flush with pride, foolish pride. That hubris would be flushed away soon enough. "But this fellow would never, ever let it come to that. You wouldn't see how he killed you, and you wouldn't want to."

Sideswipe's hands balled to firsts, and he bridled. He snapped, "More like your security systems failed."

Red Alert recoiled, as if struck, and regarded Sideswipe with hurt optics. Slowly, he nodded and admitted, "I failed. At least I'm doing something about it, instead of heckling a security officer."

"Maybe if you spent as much time working as you do talking, you'd have more to show for it." Sideswipe sneered.

"You are the one who interrupted me!" Red Alert roared and shoved Sideswipe out of his office. He turned to secure the door, only to find Sky Lynx peering from Sideswipe to him.

Red Alert groaned and asked, "Let me guess, you need to talk to me, too?"

"Well, you were not answering any radio salutations," the dinobird sniffed.

Red Alert checked. So he had turned his radio off. When had that happened? Was it before or after he had looked into the isotope concentrations of the air gathered from Lowbrow's quarters? "Right. What's the problem?"

"It seems to be the same problem as before," Sky Lynx replied hesitantly, looking over his shoulder.

"I'm working on it," Red Alert grumbled. How many times would he have to say it before his fellows were convinced?

"The quandary is the same," Sky Lynx hedged, "The victim, however, is different." Red Alert felt his sparkplug sputter. "Modus operandi is of precise verisimilitude, but it is Hobnail who is slain."

Red Alert snarled at Sideswipe, who at least was wearing a fairly stricken expression, "Get out of here!" The other Lamborghini scattered. Red Alert looked back to Sky Lynx, who looked slightly vexed by his outburst. "Have units been scrambled already? Where is the scene?"

The units did scramble, and Red Alert sprinted behind Sky Lynx. The scene was the same as before: just a wretched pile of metal. It made paint popping and cracking noises as it cooled. Sky Lynx craned his head at Red Alert and commented, "It almost seems as if there is some phantasm at work here."

"A ghost?" Red Alert asked bleakly. "I hope to heterodynes not. No, there has to be a mortal excuse, something explainable. I won't accept anything else."

"Belief and desire never change a thing," Sky Lynx sniffed, apparently disgusted by the scene.

"On the contrary," Red Alert replied with unwanted mirth, "someone desired Hobnail dead."

* * *

Red Alert was never fond of going before Rodimus Prime. In the security business, no news was the only sort of good news worth mentioning. Also, Rodimus Prime had personally asked him here this day. Red Alert preferred it the other way around, if he had to interact with the Prime. Rodimus Prime was like an unknown codex, and the old, tried solution methods couldn't even make a start on cracking the code.

Rodimus Prime, seated confidently behind his desk, glanced up at Red Alert. He advised, "You might want to try loosening up a little."

Red Alert stifled a growl; right there was another reason he avoided the Prime. He replied, "Sir, it was laxity that got me into this problem."

Rodimus Prime waved a hand, optics flickering over to one of the reports piled on his desk. He suggested, "Don't beat yourself up over it. It doesn't do any good." He was certainly a fine one to say such a thing! "Now, there are two dead. That's two more than there should be. What do you have on it?"

Red Alert would never say it, but the second death did clear up the case a bit. He reported, "There are similarities between Lowbrow and Hobnail, sir. They are both older Autobots. They were both alive and active on Cybertron within the time period when the war was first gathering steam, when the factional lines were just being first drawn." Not that Rodimus Prime knew anything of that era. "They were staunch supporters of your predecessor, from the first."

Rodimus Prime raised a hand, as if to ask a question, and did, "Then why now?"

"I'm trying to figure that out before the killer strikes again-"

"You think he will?"

Red Alert nodded unhappily. The problem with knowing the enemy was that the enemy was a pack of psychopathic glitches. "I'm almost certain. Decepticons don't do twos."

* * *

The security expert never thought that he would be inconvenienced to hear from his old pal Inferno, and yet, he was. Red Alert tried to keep his attention at the concerned face on the screen. He inquired politely, "Ah, Inferno. How are the Survivors?" The Survivors were an elite Autobot combat group, although Red Alert has misgivings over one of the members.

"I'm afraid that's the problem there," Inferno drawled. Red Alert flinched and prayed it wasn't another murder. "Y'see, Springer doesn't think we have a problem. Y'know Carnivac, right?"

Red Alert started, "The Decepticon defector? Doesn't surprise me, if he's been causing trouble." He was deeply suspicious of anyone who signed on with the Autobots out of a desire for vengeance, and Carnivac's background as a Decepticon Mayhem did not help matters.

"He's a lone wolf. Likes to be solitary. An' he's never been really right in the head since Catilla died. So it's not odd for him to wander off with no contact for days at a time, but," Inferno paused, frowning. "Bucko's been gone way too long this time. Makes a search and rescue truck antsy. Springer figures he's gonna limp back, tail between his legs, but I ain't so sure."

"Missing person case," Red Alert muttered. "Beautiful." It wasn't a murder, not a confirmed one.

"I've heard that punk's got ya running on another case, but do you think you could take a look?" Inferno asked.

Red Alert was caught. Inferno had come to him first, no doubt. He owed his old friend, big time. He wheedled, "I'm really busy..."

Inferno looked vaguely hurt and huffed, "You're gonna miss out on alla the action."

"I have plenty enough action as it is," Red Alert ground out, "but I can put Streetwise on the data analysis. He needs the practice."

"So you'll be down here?" Inferno poked, seeking to confirm.

"Yes, I'll give it a quick look. Maybe I'll be able to come back with a fresh perspective on my mess." Red Alert could only hope. The case was getting staler than the scent of smoke by the minute.

* * *

Checking his sources turned up a tip on Carnivac's disappearance. Another Autobot investigator, one Sharpshooter, had an idea what might have happened to the wolf. Sharpshooter kept up in a border town that had been a conclave of Decepticon iniquity before the Autobots had succeeded in ousting the Decepticons from Cybertron. He was posted there because his skills met the needs in the area, according to his file. That file was, Red Alert had to note, vexingly vague. He rather expected the shabby little office with the antique desk in the ramshackle building in the worst part of a bad town. He certainly wasn't expecting a rather bad condition gun Transformer of Decepticon lines. At least his optics were blue, if a dark, murky one. Feeling stupid as he said it, Red Alert inquired, "You're Sharpshooter?" The name was congruous with the form, he supposed. There was also a little placard in fine calligraphy on the desk.

"Last time I checked, although there's a Decepticon jerk out there who calls me 'Target: Irony'," the other Autobot replied. He had a tired, gruff voice. At Red Alert's blank look, he explained, "My specialty is art crime." Red Alert upped his estimate of the battered-looking Transformer; art crime was an area that even the toughest of support column tried to foist on other people to investigate. "A 'con sculptor got his hands on me. This happened. He still thinks I'm his piece of artwork." Sharpshooter scowled and brushed a hand down one of his arms, as if that would dust away the anomalous alternate form.

"...you got away?" Red Alert boggled. Then he narrowed his optics. Perhaps Sharpshooter had been released on purpose with sleeper commands implanted deep into his mind. He would have to be careful around the fellow.

Sharpshooter shrugged and opined, "Decepticon artists, generally speaking, have a little problem with the concepts of 'simplicity' and 'effectiveness'. Filigree handcuffs are pretty, but they're pretty useless, too. Enough about that. You're looking for Carnivac?"

Red Alert nodded and clarified, "He's been missing longer than usual. An old friend of mine is Carnivac's teammate, and he was concerned."

"He should be," Sharpshooter said bluntly. "Carnivac killed Needlenose." He paused and then explained. "Remember Chic Chips? Nifty little things, wonderfully crafted, mostly pointless? Needlenose invented those. He was still really popular in the art world, what there's left of it."

Red Alert saw where the line of thought was going and said it himself, "You think the artists might have taken Carnivac out?"

Sharpshooter wagged a finger and chastised, "Not 'the artists'. Who the scrap are 'the artists', anyway? I sure don't think Grapple means Carnivac any ill will. Some of the weirdies, though? Yeah."

Red Alert frowned at the invocation of petty semantics and asked, "Do you have anything solid?"

"Slog - do you know who Slog is?"

"A butcher," Red Alert replied without hesitation.

Sharpshooter grimaced and allowed, "Close enough, but don't say that where we'll be going, or you'll end up butchered. Slog said he'd have a reward for whoever delivered to him Carnivac. A better reward if he was still alive. Slog likes them live, see." Red Alert muttered something dire. "It's not combat art if there's no combat involved. Anyway, someone's called Slog out to collect that reward. They're making a big thing about it, a memorial party if you will. If the fellow's faking about having Carnivac, I feel sorry for his soul."

"You go Decepticon party-crashing often?" Red Alert asked dubiously.

"There will be Autobots there," Sharpshooter replied in no uncertain terms. "Don't make that shocked, innocent face. I mostly know who they are, and I keep tabs on them, and if they step over the line, I'll be there to take them in. There are neutrals, too."

"'Mostly'?" Red Alert repeated dubiously. "Forget it. You want to wander into a party full of 'weirdies', as you put it, and... what?"

"You get your answer about Carnivac. You maybe even rescue him, if he's alive." Sharpshooter didn't seem to think the chances of that happening were too hot.

Red Alert rubbed his head, which was starting to ache, and he demanded, "And where is this party, anyway? Charr?"

Sharpshooter smiled grimly and said, "You know just as well as I do that Cybertron's not an Autobot planet. It's an occupied planet. Towns like these hoist the Decepticon standard as soon as our provisional governors turn their backs."

Red Alert had to agree there. He went over the general idea, "So we waltz into a dissident enclave - I'm sorry, I'm having problems with that very idea there."

"Got a better idea?" Sharpshooter asked, as if he did exactly that all the time. He probably did, Red Alert thought sullenly.

Red Alert paused and rubbed his chin. After a moment, he replied, "Actually, I do. Give me a bit of time to radio Inferno."

* * *

Red Alert drove Sharpshooter over to the location of the memorial, the revolver sitting shotgun. Sharpshooter didn't say much throughout the ride, and for a motionless, expressionless object, he looked distinctly uncomfortable. Was he getting cold feet about the whole daft idea? They arrived at the location, an abandoned factory in yet another run-down town that had been in Decepticon territory not too long ago. Red Alert grumbled over his internal speakers, "How do they even get here? We have a security network. I know! I run it!"

Sharpshooter replied, "I think you just made it clear that's your problem, not mine." For that remark, Red Alert transformed, unceremoniously ejecting Sharpshooter from his seat. Disappointingly, the revolver transformed before he hit the ground. In robot form, he looked unashamed and took a swig out of a curiously filigreed flask. "Look, if I knew, they wouldn't be having this party, would they?"

"I should hope not," Red Alert snapped.

Sharpshooter withdrew an old-style memory stick of some sort and held it out to Red Alert. When he saw that Red Alert wasn't taking the device, he explained, "It's a piece of Needlenose's artwork. At his memorial, they'll at least try to get it off you, if you wear it, before they try to kill you. They wouldn't risk ruining it."

Red Alert cautiously took the gadget, and finding it mostly inert, he turned it over in his hand. The casing was semi-translucent, and Red Alert peered at the circuitry within. He looked up and asked, "Where's the heat sink?"

"As I recall, Needlenose was famous for pioneering distributed heat sinks, among another things," Sharpshooter replied, looking at the dilapidated factory with more interest.

Red Alert ran his fingers along the casing, which felt pleasantly smooth to the touch. It was a slim design and would have been smaller than anything of its generation. Sighing, he slotted it into a wrist port. A few antique LEDs sparkled to life. No Trojans or viruses leapt forth from the thing, no tunnelling data-worms. Red Alert questioned, "Why is the port Autobot-compatible?"

"Needlenose wasn't built Decepticon. He would have probably signed on with us if Optimus Prime didn't tell him his work was trash. Artists are pissy that way. C'mon, let's get going."

Red Alert looked at the fine circuitwork again and decided that must not have been Optimus Prime's best day. Red Alert would have sacrificed a Minibot for an engineer who could design circuits like that for his security systems. He called in a query over radio, and as satisfied as ever would be, Red Alert followed Sharpshooter into the derelict factory.

The outside belied the inside in the same way that 'misunderstood, noble warriors of honour' belied the word 'Decepticon'. There was no reigning style, only colourful chaos. Murals and three-dimensional collages covered the walls, floor, and ceiling. He didn't know what composed the confetti that was strewn over the floor and hung suspended in the air like lazy Seekers, and he didn't want to. In the centre of the maelstrom was a throne of twisted bodies, and a squat, bladed fellow sat upon it, serene in the chaos. Red Alert gaped, and the words, "Where do they find all the time to do this?" came to his mouth.

"Worry about the day when they actually mobilise on something useful," Sharpshooter suggested wryly.

Red Alert moaned. Was there no end to the worries piled upon his plate? He looked around and listened, trying to take in more than the fact that the colours seared his optics. Red Alert heard familiar voices but rather hoped he hadn't.

"Cliffjumper isn't a piñata!" protested Air Raid.

Red Alert tried to draw his attention away from the trio of Aerialbots who were trying to stop Mixmaster from tying Cliffjumper to a tough chain and the chain to the ceiling. He wanted to pretend that they weren't there, but he couldn't. Red Alert's plan had just had sprocket wrench inserted where a sprocket wrench ought not go, and he was none too pleased.

"We could just fly up there and take him down," Slingshot pointed out, looking eager along those lines.

"Uhm, but we don't fly in robot mode," Fireflight reminded.

"Tell me you're a trio of Seekers with lousy senses of humour but decent fashion sense, or Silverbolt's going to have your wings," Red Alert advised, approaching the trio.

"Red Alert! I'm gonna stuff Mixmaster in his own drum just as soon as I get down from here," Cliffjumper vowed.

"This is Cliffjumper's fault," Slingshot declared. Air Raid came down with the look of a Minibot who had been caught in the energon cabinet. Fireflight didn't seem to have noticed Red Alert, despite his words.

"I see," Red Alert said levelly. Behind him, he could hear Sharpshooter insisting to a malevolent pair of voices that he just wanted to pay his respects. Red Alert snorted and wondered why Sharpshooter hadn't taken his own advice about wearing Needlenose's work. "So Cliffjumper picked up you three strapping Aerialbots and dropped you poor, innocent souls off in this den of-"

"Drugs and rock'n'roll?" Mixmaster offered helpfully, cinching a knot around Cliffjumper's flailing hands. The Constructicon was hovering above head height. Red Alert only marked two others in the lime green and purple, Scavenger and Bonecrusher by the sound of them. Mixmaster added, "I think it's good that the Autobot youth is finally getting exposed to some culture. And the punch. That's more etching than exposure, though."

"The Autobot youth is getting out of here," Red Alert gritted.

"My fault? You're the blockhead who said, 'Only wussies are scared of artists. What are they going to do, paint at us?'" Cliffjumper protested. He landed a kick on Mixmaster's shin, which the Constructicon ignored.

"And you're the rustface who said jets are fops!" Slingshot bickered right back. "Now you're the one getting fopped around."

"Aren't our jet forms too big to fit in here, anyway?" asked Fireflight, still on the topic of flying up to rescue Cliffjumper from Mixmaster's depredations. "Oh hi, Red Alert."

"What are you doing here, anyway?" Air Raid asked, squinting.

"That's for you to answer and me to find out," Red Alert spat.

"Like Slingshot said, Cliffjumper was being stupid, so we had to go keep him out of trouble," Air Raid explained.

"And you're doing such a brilliant job of it," Red Alert sniped. "Seems more like you three decided to be stupid right along with Cliffjumper. You should hurry back to Iacon."

"Aerialbots don't run!" Slingshot declared.

"We fly," Fireflight added, as if that clarified.

"Silverbolt runs," Red Alert reminded. "And he's smarter than you three." He sighed. Talking sense to this group was about as useful trying to talk down a storm. Fireflight was all right, but not with a pair of his brothers at his sides.

Mixmaster finished his multifold-overhand-knot and declared, pointing to Cliffjumper, "Piñata!"

"We can't leave now," Air Raid protested, pointing to Cliffjumper.

"Yeah, we have to stay and see Cliffjumper get the tar beat out of him," Slingshot crowed, rubbing his hands together. Air Raid elbowed his brother.

Red Alert watched Cliffjumper swing about angrily and reflected that the Aerialbots were mostly just learning about cursing, not culture. Considering the other company, he wasn't sure if cursing was worse than culture, though, even if the one about Motormaster propositioning Vector Sigma was rather rude. Red Alert heard the gurgling sound of liquid, and he snapped his gaze over to Fireflight, who was chatting with a pleasant yellow semi-truck cab. She had poured Fireflight a glass of a turquoise blue fluid, shot through with fluffy white clouds. She also had an optic visor red as any furnace and a prominent purple syndrome. Red Alert snatched the drink out of Fireflight's hand, causing a storm in the fluid, and chastised, "Did Optimus Prime never teach you winglets not to take drinks from strangers?"

Firelight considered that, shrugged, and replied, "Nope."

"What's a fuss bucket like you doing here?" the semi-truck asked, voice sweetened energon and about as reassuring as sugar in the gas tank.

"Fussing," Red Alert grumbled. He looked down at the drink. There was actually electrical discharge crackling forth from the dark clouds.

Fireflight made a soft 'ooh' and gazed at the clouds intently. After a few moments, he looked over at the semi and said softly, "That's quite pretty. Seems like it would be a shame to drink it."

"Drinking is why I made it," the semi reminded. She snatched the drink away from Red Alert and, with a cry of, "Cheers," downed it herself, mouth lit blue for a moment.

Fireflight's optics cycled a blink, and he asked, "It had to be safe then, didn't it?"

"Drinking's safer than fighting," the truck said coyly.

"She's probably immune to her own venom," Red Alert suggested dourly.

"You have to be immune to yours," she said cheerily, "or you'd choke on your own words."

Scavenger emerged from a crowd, a crowbar in hand, and asked Mixmaster, "I couldn't find any sticks. Will this do?"

Bonecrusher snatched the crowbar away from Scavenger and blurted, "Do? This is like an upgrade!"

Red Alert looked back at Cliffjumper, who had been left hanging. He was this close to cashing in his plan early, but first, he asked a snowy white shuttle who sparkled like diamonds, "When is Slog going to receive his, ah, delivery?"

"The Philistine?" the shuttle replied, voice soft. "He was due half an hour ago. Slog isn't happy. Just look at him." He gestured, cut-out wrist-blades a-flutter, at the squat fellow on the throne.

Red Alert nodded nervously, tapping his foot. He would give it a little more time, and then he would usher out the quarrelling quartet of fools and Sharpshooter, too. Red Alert listened for the Autobot motors in the room and sought out their faces. Sharpshooter said that he kept tabs on them, but Red Alert was going to use whole Sticky Notes, as the humans did. There was Coldtouch, who had always been a loner. Vade Retro had gone a bit funny in the head after Unicron attacked. Polemy... Red Alert's list was entirely too long, when it was complete.

He sought out his mixture of morons, when a cloaked figure entered. The cloak was of ragged, mottled textile, and the figure that it draped seemed hunched and wide, although slim at the legs. The cloak draped down, pooling, hiding even the feet. It could have out-thrust doors, it could have wings, or it could have anything at all. There was a moment of quiet, which Red Alert appreciated.

The figure seemed to tilt its head to one side, and with a voice like one of Mirage's long-gone posh friends, he intoned, "I think it's a riot that you wouldn't touch Needlenose's work when he was alive, Slog. You called it 'trite', didn't you? 'Banal in its mass-production'? Hilarious that you'd hold a memorial for him. Tell me, are you just celebrating his death?"

Red Alert listened past the bravado, to the almost inaudible whine of jet engines. He could say they were not Seeker engines but little else.

Slog leapt at the figure from halfway across the factory, showing himself as one of the Decepticons who was frighteningly good at remembering he had anti-gravs. The figure whirled, and Slog's keen claws missed metal. They did, however, snag the cloak and pulled it billowing to the floor. Before them stood a Decepticon jet clad in silver, cobalt, and lavender, slender and proud, with an unique build that said he'd kill people for calling him a Seeker. Red Alert put the model at a F-16XL. He was no hunchback; around his shoulders was the slain body of the wolf Carnivac. His bearing was imperious, as if the party was all for him. It dawned on Red Alert that it really was.

Slog looked up at the fellow coldly and said, "Late, you are."

Amusement glinted in the jet's white optics, and he demurred, "Not anymore."

Red Alert found Sharpshooter and hissed at him, "Why didn't you tell me that Needlenose the artist was Needlenose the Mayhem?"

"I figured you knew," Sharpshooter mumbled, rubbing his optics. "Slag, that's really him."

"Oh, of course. All artsy engineers grow up to be elite killers. Silly me," Red Alert whispered and tilted his head to the side derisively. "Carnivac killed him. Carnivac doesn't make mistakes about killing. Inferno was very explicit." Inferno was a rather vivid if rough story-teller when he wanted to be, and that talent had been quite unfortunate when he had described what Carnivac did to his prey.

Needlenose held his arms out wide, Carnivac's corpse apparently a light burden on his shoulders, and announced, "The vanished has returned. Missed me?" He was mobbed by adoration immediately.

Red Alert took the opportunity to shoot down Cliffjumper, who proved not to contain any sweets, just a lot of anger. Fireflight said, "Hey, why didn't you do that earlier?"

"Move!" Red Alert urged, herding the three Aerialbots and the irate Minibot out through a cracked window. Sharpshooter was apparently keen enough on the uptake to follow. He made the call.

Springer, Skids, Broadside, and, of course, Inferno burst into the factory, and all was chaos. Sharpshooter commented, looking back, "Your buddy's a Survivor, huh?" There was grudging respect in his voice. As the successors to the Wreckers, the Survivors deserved their hype. Mostly.

Red Alert nodded, transforming. He added, "I'm really proud of Inferno. I still don't know why Skids is in there, though."

* * *

He visited Inferno in the medical ward. Inferno was as proud of each injury as Red Alert was of Inferno, and he regaled Red Alert with tales of how he had acquired every wound. He pointed out an electrical burn and said, "That Needlenose pegged me there. If his electrostatic overloader rifle was more accurate, he'd be dangerous."

"You told me that Carnivac killed him," Red Alert reminded.

"He did! Slashed him from nape to knees, cut off all his limbs, tore out his throat, severed his wings, and slashed him some more for good measure," Inferno replied, squirming a bit as First Aid worked on his damage. The medic looked a bit peaky at Inferno's description.

"If Carnivac killed him, why is Needlenose not dead?" Red Alert asked patiently, not expecting a useful answer.

"He's a Mayhem. Mayhems are Decepticons with an extra helping of annoying sauce. At least they're usually hunting their own, rather than us. Git got away this time, too." Inferno snapped his fingers, frustrated. "At least we recovered Carnivac's body. We don't leave a man behind, even if he's a brooding wolf."

"Could Carnivac have over-exaggerated?" Red Alert pressed. "Did you see the body?"

"I don't think so, really. He was always pretty serious. Nah, there was no time to look at 'con stiffs." Inferno grabbed Red Alert's wrist and asked, "What's this?"

Red Alert had quite forgotten about the Chic Chip. He removed it and excused, "This? This is a Chic Chip. Sharpshooter told me to wear it." He squinted at the device thoughtfully. "Needlenose has to be an excellent engineer. Perhaps he backed himself up."

"Or something, sure," Inferno agreed. First Aid worked on replacing Inferno's ladder, which looked more like one of Daniels' pretzel-snacks than a ladder.

"You know... there was another Mayhem that Carnivac killed." Thoughts came to him, stilted and unwilling. "Name of Spinister. Stealth to make a F-117 jealous, aim like a sniper, and a predilection for flamethrowers? Inferno, know how I told you that there is no such thing as coincidence, merely correlation as yet undiscovered?"

The firefighter grunted in response, as First Aid fitted in the hinge pin for the new ladder.

"I hope this is just a coincidence." Red Alert knew Spinister. He had been younger and dumber then, but he hoped that the helicopter hadn't gotten any smarter with age. Spinister wasn't a Mayhem then, and Red Alert wasn't a security director. If he was, he would have strangled himself over his own laxity. No, Spinister had just been a Decepticon prisoner in a cell, and Red Alert was the one assigned to question him.

* * *

_Red Alert looked down at his datapad. The prisoner had said nothing, not even the defiant Name, Rank, and Serial Number of bravos. He was silent as a cemetery and half as warm. He did not sit on the bunk, did not hide under, did not seek the shadows of the corners. Instead, he slowly, slowly paced near the bars. Some captives exuded the impression of a caged animal. This one made Red Alert feel as he himself was the caged animal, the one under examination. He tapped his datapad and started, "I know that your name is Spinister. You're attached to Snarler's group. A shock trooper. Your own side probably thinks that you're expendable."_

_Spinister made no reply except to continue studying Red Alert as if he was dissecting him with his optics._

_"You rolled off the Helios lines. Plenty of Autobots have rolled off there, too," Red Alert added. They were all a bit off, too, but of that fact, he made no mention. He noted down that this particular helicopter was missing a bit of one of his blades. Blade weakness was a common flaw of helicopters, particularly the Helios lines, but if he had been unfairly abused while he was in Autobot prison, the Decepticon propaganda-mongers would have a field day._

_The prisoner seemed unimpressed by Red Alert's knowledge of his manufacturing-place._

_"Look, I'm going to keep talking to you until you talk, and I don't know many good jokes," Red Alert threatened weakly, taking a step forward._

_In a flash, Spinister lunged, powerful as a tunnel snake springing and with all the sinuous grace. Just barely squeezed through the bars, his fingers bit like fangs into Red Alert's upper arms, and he pulled the Autobot against the bars. Red Alert howled as the energy bars crackled and seared his metal. Spinister secured his grip, forcing the fingers of one hand into Red Alert's shoulder joint. He let go with his other hand and produced the missing blade tip. As soon as Red Alert saw the jagged blade, it was gone, buried in his own fuel tank._

_Spinister spoke with a low, quiet voice that was more tone than undertone, so hollow that it lacked even a shell, "Listen well, for I have ceded to your demands that I speak." He flicked his finger against his thumb, and the metal squealed and protested the friction, releasing a spray of sparks. Red Alert could feel his own sticky fuel running down his body and struggled, trying to escape the Decepticon's one-handed grip. "Set me free, or I will set you ablaze. A poor substitute for the smelting pits, but it will do to end you."_

_The guards looked to Red Alert, worried. One muttered, "There's no way we can get a hit on him without pegging Red Alert, too."_

_Red Alert gasped, "You're in too close. You want to go up in flame, too?"_

_Spinister must have. Heedless, he scraped his finger against his thumb, igniting Red Alert's precious life-fuel. The flames took Red Alert, surging inside, wicked up by his dripping fuel. Spinister held him fast against the bars, not budging a span as Red Alert writhed._

_One of the guards, unable to stand the sight, hit release for the energy bars that kept Spinister confined. He received that blade-shank to his throat in thanks. Through the blaze, Red Alert watched Spinister run. Only when the helicopter was gone from sight did Red Alert allow himself to fall the floor, a pool of misery and flame. Pink and purple after-images of the Decepticon taunted him, scorched into his optics. Over the sizzle of the conflagration, Red Alert roared to the guard still standing, "Follow him!"_

_Then that fellow from his search and rescue group, Inferno, burst into the room, and all was cool again.

* * *

_

"Spinister's that punk that nailed you good back in the day, ain't he?" Inferno drawled.

"You could put it that way," Red Alert answered diplomatically, shuddering. "He inspired me to improve security, anyway. Did you see his body, by any chance?"

"Nah," Inferno answered, looking a little worried.

"Spinister, were he alive, would be my primary suspect for the murders of Lowbrow and Hobnail," Red Alert said slowly, "He was too young to have known them before the war, but he was the only stealth expert of which I know who uses a leakin' flamethrower, of all the absurd tools. One that burns extremely hot."

Inferno plucked up the Chic Chip and played with the ornament absently. He commented, "This thing's pretty nifty lookin'. What's it do?"

"Nothing much of any consequence," Red Alert replied distantly. "Just an antique bit of circuits."

"Hobnail always got mighty angry whenever the Technobots called him that," Inferno noted, triggering the rhythmic LEDs on the Chic Chip.

Red Alert paused. He speculated aloud, "It's before the war. Optimus Prime's calling these things wasteful. I bet Hobnail and Lowbrow are, too, big Prime supporters like they were. Ironhide, may he rest in peace, would have done it as well. The artist is apparently so offended by this that he signs on with a bunch of psychopaths. I can safely say he's carrying a grudge and a big one. That artist is Needlenose, a Mayhem, and recently returned from the dead. Now, Spinister was a Mayhem, too, and maybe Needlenose had some blackmail on him or something. Taking advantage of their deaths as the best kind of cover, Needlenose v.2 boots up an old save-state of Spinister and cashes in what he's got on Spinister for a few revenge killings. Sound plausible?"

Inferno thought for a moment and rubbed his chin. Hesitantly, he agreed, "Seems awfully complex, but I guess so. Going with your idea that it's this fellow, how do you detect him?"

"You don't," Red Alert answered ruefully. "Even the files we captured when the Decepticon strongholds fell have nothing on how he does it. The best we can do is predict who he'll target next, which," he took the Chic Chip back from Inferno, "may be easier than it sounds."

Inferno grinned and suggested flippantly, "Just ask all the old coots what they think of those doodads?"

* * *

Youngsters like Streetwise thought that stakeouts were great fun. They also tended to get bored in the early hours and wander off. Red Alert would have expressed his displeasure at Streetwise's unprofessional conduct if he wasn't keeping to strict radio silence. He hadn't expected the Protectobot to last and had been counting on him bailing. Red Alert was motionless at his post under Kup's berth. He could hear the veteran slowly taking his musket apart on his desk. His hands were steady as he reached for the oil and removed the cap. The scraping noise of the threads of the cap against the bottle seemed almost unbearably loud. Red Alert measured each oiled slide of piston, comparing lengths to check for stress and tension.

Kup was remarkably calm. This wasn't the first time Decepticons had tried to kill him, and old Autobots didn't get to be old by being stupid. Red Alert remembered how the Dinobots, who had overheard, had insisted on staying in Kup's room, and he had agonised on how he would convince the Dinobots to leave. Kup had a story for the occasion. He always did. When the tale was over, the Dinobots knew why they had to leave, even if they didn't like it.

Red Alert had booby trapped the air vents, just to be careful. Zero degree molecules would quench the fire of any would-be assassin. A crack squad, with the Dinobots included, waited not far outside Kup's quarters. Doubtless, they felt pretty good about their chances. Red Alert remembered instead that if the murderer got the first shot, all preparation would be for naught.

Red Alert heard a faint scraping noise from the wall. There was a solid series of clicks as Kup reassembled his musket, not hasty but swift. A panel fell from the wall opposite the door, and Kup hit the void with his corrosive acid rounds. Red Alert rolled out from under the recharge berth, his particle beam rifle in his hands. He sprung to his feet and peered at the darkness. The area behind the panel hissed with acid, but the acid rounds had caught only a rather forlorn set of wires. There was no killer to be seen.

"Reminds me of the tunnel snakes of Markor," Kup whispered, scanning his quarters.

Red Alert made no reply, instead straining to sieve meaningful acoustics from the background noise. There was a tapping underneath the floor. As Red Alert bent to place a hand against the floor, the tapping stopped. He stiffened, tense. The gaps between the walls and ceilings were by necessity large enough for massive cable bundles, but navigating them was a nightmarish proposition. Red Alert had put Bumblebee to the task, and the cheerful yellow fellow had not yet forgiven the security director.

There was a wrenching of metal behind him, and Red Alert felt a grimy, loathsome hand ensnare his ankle. Flat on his face, Red Alert grasped frantically for purchase and grabbed at the seams of the floor plates to keep from being dragged under. Kup turned but was unable to draw a bead on whatever was under the recharge berth. By the time that the veteran had dropped to a crouch, the grasp on Red Alert's ankle ceased. Red Alert scurried to his feet, pistons hammering like a forge in full swing. Trying banally to keep his spirits up, he tossed off, "Did the tunnel snakes of Markor do that, too?"

"Actually, lad, they did," Kup replied archly. He turned back around and stared down his computer monitor and desk. He lightly touched a hand to Red Alert's arm and guided him over, gesturing that Red Alert ought to look there, too.

The whole wall gave way, sending the computer and desk crashing into Red Alert and Kup. The veteran must have expected something like it, because he side-stepped with all the experience of ages. Red Alert was neither so lucky nor so practised and felt the crushing weight of the desk pin him to the floor. He had a decent view of the ceiling, and that was the end his visual capabilities. Red Alert gasped as his hood buckled under, and his engine block screeched with protest at the abuse.

In agony and desperation, he listened to what he could not see. Red Alert could hear Kup, vibrant despite his age, but of the stalking shadow, there was only white noise, pure and innocent. Wordless, Red Alert screamed on the radio, crying for those eager reinforcements. Kup's acoustic echoes were strained, as if he was bound in a grapple.

Red Alert stared at the ceiling helplessly, praying that the door would open before it became entirely too hot in here, before the stakeout became a funeral pyre. He cursed himself and his prideful plans. Those zero degree molecules had done a fat lot of good against a spectre who would brave the knotty tangles of electrical bundles, and his rifle was useless when he couldn't move, let alone aim. There it was in all simplicity: he, Red Alert, was useless. He howled his agony as if he was young and ablaze.

His shoulder mounted rocket still functioned. Red Alert fired it upwards, the only direction it could possibly go. The ceiling exploded gratifyingly. Shrapnel covered the room, and a blanket of ice brought stillness and quiet upon the violent tableau. The zero degree molecules burned worse than fire. They delved deep into his structure, while flame only ever licked his surface, but Red Alert took an exquisitely cold comfort in knowing that the lurking phantom was now just as immobile as he was.

Grimlock broke down the door and craned his toothy head inside. A snowflake, condensed out of the air, landed on his blunt nose. The Dinobot commented, bewildered, "Me Grimlock not think Kup live in freezer."

* * *

Red Alert still felt a chill looking at Spinister. The Decepticon was bound by anti-grav electroshock manacles of Skyfire's design. The device looked like an overly technical inner-tube and held Spinister's ankles and wrists together behind his back and kept him hovering, face down, several metres above the floor. He could touch nothing and could barely move. First Aid had him hopped up on enough tranquilisers to shut up even Bluestreak. Spinister was sealed behind three different kinds of bars and a two-way mirror blocked what blurry view of the outside world he might hope to have. The Autobots had hosed off his grunge and stripped him of his weapons, leaving him just a bleached, pathetic little helicopter stinking of cleaning solvent. Red Alert knew that, and peering through the mirror at Spinister still left him cold.

Inferno patted him on the shoulder and advised, "Staring at him ain't gonna do you any good. C'mon, let's get you down to Emerald Friday's."

Red Alert spread his arms wide, hands beseeching, and he complained, "We shouldn't even be keeping him captive in intact form! He should be in a little glowing pink cube, in a locked drawer. I'd eat the key, too."

"Red Alert," Inferno said firmly, "we are going to Emerald Friday's, and you are going to get lit off your skidplate and forget all about this mess." He tightened his grip on Red Alert's shoulder and steered the security officer out of the brig. Red Alert had to admit that Inferno was right. Sighing and staring was getting him nowhere fast, except maybe to a mental breakdown. He wondered if Spinister would laugh to know that he was such a pain, even pacified. No, Spinister didn't laugh. He didn't cry. All he did was make soldiers die.

He didn't deserve to lurk in Red Alert's mind, haunting every corner. Red Alert was going to have fun purging the helicopter from those dark recesses, he told himself. His radio commlink flicked out of his arm as he received a call, and Inferno shot Red Alert a pointed look. Red Alert protested, "It's from Prime. I've got to take this one. Hello? ...hostage situation? I... yes, of course. I'll be there, sir." Inferno shot Red Alert a withering glance and tugged on his arm meaningfully. Red Alert retracted his commlink and replied, abashed, "You can come, too!"

With Inferno hanging stubbornly onto his arm, Red Alert raced out of Iacon. There was a gathering of Autobots large and small outside of Iacon. On a hill not far from the city stood a Decepticon jet clutching a struggling, frightened Aerialbot. Between the crowd and the hostage-taker stood Rodimus Prime. Red Alert sprinted to his side, only somewhat slowed by Inferno.

Skydrive writhed in Needlenose's grip. Needlenose stared impassively at the crowd and idly tapped a light burst discharger against Skydive's head, as if to remind the Autobots of the situation, lest they get cocky.

Red Alert judged Needlenose to be the cocky one, as the jet still showed the injuries that the Survivors had inflicted upon him. Inferno elbowed Red Alert and whispered, "See that gash down his wing? That's from Skids."

Rodimus Prime stated, looking more confident than he could possibly feel, "You know that Galvatron's going to smelt you for a stunt like this. Be reasonable."

"Reasonable? You have something of mine. What's reasonable is that you hand it over to me," Needlenose replied, sneering mouthlessly.

Inferno growled, "Carnivac's at rest, next to Catilla. You ain't getting him back."

Needlenose laughed, as Spinister never did. The sound was deceptively light and airy, like bubbles. He then snarled, "Carnivac? I couldn't care less about that mangy mongrel. Give me my helicopter. Give me Spinister."

Red Alert looked right at Rodimus Prime and mouthed 'no'. Rodimus Prime asked, "No? Would you like to tell Silverbolt why he's down a brother, Red Alert?"

"Silverbolt's down a brother because somebody," Needlenose static-coughed, almost politely, "can't tell a real jet from a diseased Seeker and thinks the same sad tactics that work against Seekers are a panacea." He pinched Skydive's cheek, earning a death glare from the Aerialbot. "A scissors manoeuvre? It was almost cute, how excited you got when you thought I'd fallen for it."

"How did you get Spinister to do it?" Red Alert demanded, frustrated. He knew all the 'how's now, but the 'why's were infuriatingly vacant. Bumblebee had thrown things at Red Alert after mapping a tenth of possible passageways. Needlenose must have some really good hold on Spinister was all that Red Alert could figure.

"You presume to ask questions? Have you checked who is holding the gun? Well, if you want to play twenty questions, we could make a game of it and play hangman, too," Needlenose replied deviously and gave Skydive a smack with the discharger. "Every question I answer, I break one of Skydive's limbs. Sound fair?"

Rodimus Prime looked to Red Alert, delivering a silent 'stand down' order. Red Alert balled his fists and raged inside. He feared that Spinister would be traded in a prisoner exchange deal. In his worst nightmares, he didn't think that day would come so soon. Rodimus Prime crossed his arms and replied, "You'll get your helicopter just as soon as we get Skydive back."

Needlenose gestured, waving the discharger like a sceptre, and urged, "Then get Spinister out here - intact, unbound, and sane, with his weapons. Should you deliver him with any defects, I'll enact the same defects on this darling little Cessna."

Rodimus Prime looked back to his Autobots and commanded, "Get Spinister out!" He pointed a finger at Needlenose. "You. You are lucky that Galvatron's on Charr right now. Don't forget that for a moment."

Warpath and Scattershot emerged from inside Iacon. Scattershot pushed Spinister, still confined by Skyfire's electroshock manacles. Warpath had Spinister's assortment of weapons piled high in his arms. Both looked sullen.

"Get those manacles off him," Needlenose intoned coldly, kneeing Skydive for emphasis. The Aerialbot whimpered, and Red Alert found himself wondering why Skydive hadn't said a word. Mindful of Needlenose's threat and promise about queries, Red Alert bit back his question, leaving a taste bitter as lye in his mouth.

"Let go of Skydive," Rodimus Prime countered.

Needlenose shrugged and threw Skydive forward, sending the poor Aerialbot flat on his face. As a hundred Autobot guns turned to target him, Needlenose held up a little red button. Red Alert heard Spinister's engine stop. Needlenose announced, a grand showman, "I got sick of the jetling's babbling about the strategic unsoundness of my plan of attack. There's a thermonuclear bomb rigged to his voicebox. I have a radio detonator for it, too. Guns down, Autobots, or Superion's down a limb."

Rodimus Prime sighed and lowered his rifle. He gestured to Scattershot. With a grunt, Scattershot pressed in the combination to release the anti-grav electroshock manacles. Spinister snatched his weapons from Warpath and ghosted to Needlenose's side, looking bleached from the cleaning the Autobots had forced upon him. Needlenose crooned, voice unexpectedly soft, "Your condition, Spinister?"

"Been better," Spinister replied curtly, fiddling with the scope on his laser rifle.

"This is the second time I've pulled you out of the fire in how long, hrm?" Needlenose jested lightly, studying Spinister closely.

"Not long enough," muttered the helicopter. The Decepticons transformed.

The F-16XL swooped back, low enough over the Autobots that his engines rattled the crowd, and called out, "Remember that itsy red button before you try to follow us." The Apache helicopter vanished from view before the F-16XL did, evidently less concerned with grandstanding. First Aid and a gaggle of Aerialbots rushed to Skydive's side. Fireflight threw an arm around Skydive and reassured him that First Aid would have the bomb out in no time.

Red Alert looked to Inferno and muttered, "Spinister's engine stopped when we all drew beads on Needlenose. Why?"

"Y'know, I think you've been overlooking the most obvious thing possible, Red Alert," Inferno said thoughtfully, tugging Red Alert in the direction of Emerald Friday's. "I think they're just friends."

"Needlenose is a fop, and Spinister's a monster," protested Red Alert, free arm flailing.

"Even fops and monsters need friends, and I reckon that sometimes they're even friends with each other," Inferno replied. "Primus knows, we do the dumbest things for each other."

"Would you climb through thousands of metres of dirty, dead-ended crawlspaces with barely enough room for a Minibot for me?" Red Alert asked, optics shining.

"I said 'dumb', not 'slagging insane'," Inferno answered, chuckling. They enjoyed their time at Emerald Friday's, and for a time, Red Alert did allow himself to forget.

* * *

Mirage was leaning back in the swivel chair in the monitor room. His slender arms were crossed behind his head, and he looked rather bored. Red Alert said, "I always thought that people don't appreciate boredom enough, especially in wartime."

Mirage wasn't startled by Red Alert's approach, and given that he was manning the monitors, Red Alert would have been disappointed if Mirage had not noticed his approach. He said, "Mhm. Come to reassign me to a task more suitable to my talents?"

"In fact, I have." Red Alert grinned wickedly. Mirage was a slender, flexible fellow and not too big. Was he also not a stealth expert? "It has come to my attention that the network of connecting spaces between the walls and floors needs mapping."

Mirage pulled up a file and noted, a light overlay of despair lacing his cultured voice, "That's the project that Bumblebee refused to complete?"

"Indeed." Red Alert nodded. The security director was the perfect picture of innocence. "Spinister will have to lay low for a while to keep off Galvatron's ire, but we need the connective spaces mapped before he gets it into his spinny little head to try something again."

Mirage placed a hand languidly over his eyes and moaned, "I'm still on punishment detail, aren't I?"

"I could make some grand speech about how you're doing a valuable service to your cause, but," Red Alert paused, "in a word? Yes."

**The End

* * *

**

**Notes:** Sharpshooter belongs to Jessica Ikley and is used with permission. Sharpshooter is also a pest. While this is a S3 G1 cartoon fic, comic-wise, this fic is situated somewhere between the Wolf Saga and Matrix Quest. By the end of the Wolf Saga, Spinister and Needlenose are dead. In Matrix Quest, they aren't dead anymore, so they either didn't die entirely or got better somehow. Also, by the time Matrix Quest rolls round, we never see Carnivac again. So Carnivac could have died. (Actually, the comic timelines are all kind of a headache, but I'm not going to get into that.)


End file.
